Phil Spector, uncovered and under the spotlight
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/21/wspec121.xml&page=1Phil Spector, uncovered and under the spotlight
By Mick Brown
Last Updated: 3:58am BST 21/08/2007Page 1 of 2
Mick Brown of the Telegraph magazine, Phil Spector's biographer, confronts the reclusive record producer outside the Los Angeles courtroom where he is standing trial for murder
In my periodic visits to Dept 106 of the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, Los Angeles, where Phil Spector is presently on trial, Spector and I have done our best to ignore each other. Well, to be more accurate he has done his best to ignore me. Spector, I'm told, is "unhappy" with the book I have written about him, and on the rare occasions when I have caught his eye across the courtroom he has fixed me with a basilisk stare.
Phil Spector arrives for jury selection in his murder trial
In court last week, I decided to bite the bullet (an unfortunate choice of phrase, perhaps, in the circumstances). Coming face to face with him in the hallway outside I greeted him with a cheery "hello, Mr Spector". The basilisk stare auto-reflexed into something that might have been a smile and he rasped back "hello".
Perhaps it wasn't the best thing for me to attempt to continue the conversation by asking "how are you doing?". The smile died on his face, and his three minders hurried him on his way.
One of the enduring fascinations of the trial has been Spector's changing wardrobe. Over the past four months he has modelled a bewildering number of frock-coated suits in a variety of fabrics and colours. These initially suggested a certain rakish, devil-may-care attitude - powder blues and dove greys, worn with big-collar, open-neck shirts in pastel colours - more Disco Inferno than murder trial.
But as the trial enters its critical, closing phase, a certain sobriety of mood seems to have come over Spector. He has now taken to wearing a tie, the better to impress on the jury perhaps that, really, he is taking this seriously; and the blonde bob wig, which lent him a creepily andronygous appearance, has been jettisoned in favour of a more conservative chestnut brown nest of curls.
Spector's coiffure is apparently supervised by his 26-year-old wife Rachelle, who recently ticked off a reporter for daring to suggest that her husband wears wigs. Rachelle's role in the trial is to arrive each day at the court clinging to Spector's arm, and then sit through the testimony - which has often been of teeth-grinding tedium - wearing an expression of saintly devotion.
advertisementIt is a touching display of marital loyalty and intimacy. But if she honestly thinks that's his real hair, you have to ask how intimate she and Spector really are.
Rachelle has been a source of constant speculation, and no little sniping, among the various trial-watchers and bloggers attending the proceedings, to the point that last week Spector's defense attorney Roger Rosen complained to the judge that disparaging remarks had been made about Mrs Spector's wardrobe in earshot of the jury.
While the trial has not captured television ratings in the way it was expected - Court-TV has long since relegated its live coverage to a web-broadcast - it has spawned a vigorous debate in the blogosphere. Two blogs in particular stand out. Betsy Ross is a seamstress, who writes under the by-line 'Sprocket' (the name of her cat).
A pleasant-looking, bespectacled woman, who describes her main interest as "criminal psychology, specifically serial rapists and murderers", Mrs Ross, who is to be found in court most days, writes a lively and discursive diary which makes the trial seem like a cross between the Perry Mason and the Archers and the 3AM girls - whos eating with who, Rachelle's wardrobe, sickness.
But the most thorough, and entertaining, reporting on the case is provided by a 44-year-old housewife in the Adirondacks named Kim Pulley, who writes on a blog called 'The Darwin Exception' ("because it's not always survival of the fittest - sometimes the idiots get through").
Mrs Pulley describes herself as "an inveterate trial watcher and knitter", and as well as regular trial reports her site also offers free knitting patterns. Struggling to find some common link between "Fuzzy hat and mittens" and the Grand Guignol spectacle that is the Spector trial I e-mailed Mrs Pulley. There are, she informs me, "tons of parallels" between the law and knitting.
"Both are very structured and very precise with rules and natural consequences for outcomes that depend on following set instructions - and they are both fluid and a skilled practioner can bend and adapt the set instructions to come up with something completely different yet strikingly dependent on the starting point. They both rely on logic and creativity."
In her spare moments between covering the Spector proceedings, Mrs Pulley has managed to complete "a little striped button down sweater and matching pants", a sweater that won grand prize at her local fair, and a baby's layette set.
"Now I am making a hoodie sweater that I started with Michael Baden's testimony and have just a sleeve left to complete. If they call many more experts I can clothe an African village full of children." At least something good has come out of all this.
Virtually all of the bloggers covering the trial seem to have made up their minds that Spector is guilty, but there is one web-page that remains indefatigable in its support for him - the 'Official Team Spector' page on MySpace. Its latest posting launches a scalding attack on Judge Fidler for allowing a fifth woman, Spector's former assistant and lover Devra Robitaille to testify that Spector once threatened her with a gun. Robitaille is expected to take the stand next week.
"I think it's pretty clear that Fidler is placing his bets on the prosecution," the posting reads, "especially when he has denied the defense to bring many valuable witnesses, denied them every motion made, censored important facts about the case. Fidler is showing a bias like we've never seen before!" So who is this staunch supporter for the defense? The web-page identifies them as a 67-year-old male, married, birthsign Capricorn, resident in Alhambra, California. Ah, that would be Phil Spector then....
One moment of high drama in the court-room last week not reported in 'The Darwin Exception' (the television cameras were turned off) was the fleeting appearance of the defendant in Judge Fidler's next case. Bailifs instructed everybody in court, including Spector, to move to one side of the room as they were "quarantining" the area between the door and the well of the court.
Quarantining? All became clear when a man was brought into the room, handcuffed and chained to a wheelchair. He was wearing orange prison fatigues, a large gag over his mouth and his head was encased in a fine-mesh hood, like a bee-keeper's bonnet.
This was Benjamin Pedro Gonzales, aka 'The Savage', who is presently serving time for the murder of at least three women and two fellow inmates, and whom one judge has described as "one of the most dangerous inmates in California history".
Gonzales is HIV positive and uses every opportunity to bite or spit saliva or blood at anybody who comes near. He has attacked prison guards and almost stabbed his own lawyer to death with a pencil. He was accompanied by seven armed deputies, all of whom were wearing protective gloves, and his lawyer, who looked as if he'd rather be representing anybody on earth but his client.
Gonzales was in the court for no longer than five minutes, while the judge scheduled a mental competency hearing, before being wheeled out leaving a stunned silence in his wake. No-one seemed more stunned than Phil Spector, who had been staring at 'The Savage' with naked fascination - mindful, perhaps, that for once his own starring role as the most bizarre spectacle in Department 106 had been emphatically eclipsed.
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